"I hope to inspire everyone and ask, where is our march? Where are our petitions? Where the fuck are our minds? I know there are a few petitions out there that I have signed, but it's not enough." -Sasha Grey
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Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Heading to D.C.

I am going to be leaving for D.C. today... the initial goal is to be useful to all of my friends that are heading out there for the Department of Peace convention.

Whether or not I am actually able to get in, and then to stay for as long as it takes to follow through on the course of actions that that get outlined for work on that in D.C., is a question.

Then my plan is to stay on in D.C. and follow through on my own interests, agendas and initiatives, which include getting a better sense of what is happening from the U.S. side on Aceh tsunami reconstruction and peace-building, communicating about the value of Aceh biodiversity and agroforestry in terms of global climate change and the strategic commodity of rubber and its bloody history in trade, renewing my passport and getting a good visa to eventually go back and finish what I started in Sumatra and Bogor.

I also have priorities that I have picked up since I left Indonesia last time. A key one is wild rice - preserving its genetic integrity from the introduction of trans-genes from other organisms or other direct manipulation with molecular tools, plus labeling that creates a differentiation between truly wild and sustainable rice from its place of origin, and paddy grown wild rice from California, etc.

I am interested in other states, especially adjacent states, picking up on and mounting parallel efforts to Peace First! / Peace in the Precincts "Peace Roots" strategy for 2008. That is something that FNVW can't obviously afford to coordinate, but it would be nice to have any Peace First! national delegates meet friends from other states in their party's national convention (the strategy is a non-partisan one, like the FNVW organization, participants bring it and their friends into any party they care to work within). Telling the story of the degree to which Peace First! achieved success in 2006 to a national media, and a national network of activists, organizers, lobbyists, random tourists, etc. will make the thing more powerful in the next iteration.

I can also teach people how I've built up the internet traffic and attention I have, and what my plans are to go to the next level with internet (and producing low cost print versions of blogs, etc.) progressive messaging. SEO is part of it, MySpace and related social networking tools is part of it, and there are discrete parts that have commercial value that I can train anyone on for cash, but I am thinking the value of teaching that is around $1500.00/day per head. D.C. has got to have a few people who understand that, as even Rumsfeld had plans for the Pentagon to get into it. I do need to eventually start making real money again, and my strong preference is to work changing the world in a progressive, more positive way... what I can and will do does change the world, one way or another. Hopefully I won't end up doing it for Hillary Clinton or the CIA, unless they can be won over to 'our perspective'...

Anyone who wants to contribute to this effort, of sending me to D.C., and enabling me to persue the agenda I laid out for Peace, fair trade rubber, meeting the lofty goals and commitments made by President Clinton on behalf of the American people in Aceh ("We will rebuild better than it was before"), etc. can send money to a post office box, or better meet me before I leave the Twin Cities. I'll stop by the 331 Club, the normal place of Drinking Liberally, but one day early - TONIGHT - before I leave town in that 6PM to 7PM window.

For better or worse, I am not in the conventional banking system and they don't take PayPal or Netpond points (and equivalent virtual currencies) at gas station in Indiana (yet). Sometimes charm and a good story works, but cash is better.